Monthly Archives: September 2014

We will be holding a meeting at The House of Representatives in Nagatacho, Tokyo on Thursday September 4, 2014 to discuss the upcoming UN conference about biological diversity. Consumers Union of Japan and the many groups and networks that follow these issues will ask questions to the government and elected representatives in the Parliament (Diet) that also care strongly about these issues. The public is invited.

We will participate in the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) conference in South Korea this fall.

Leading up to that conference, we hope this event will be a fruitful discussion about Japan’s lack of progress to ratify the Nagoya Kuala Lumpur Supplementary Protocol, that was agreed upon in Nagoya fours years ago at the UN CBD conference held in that city (after very successful negotiations held in Kuala Lumpur, thus the joint name). The aim of the protocol is to aid countries in the case of disputes when there is a need to assess the liability and redress, if genetically modified organisms cause harm to the natural environment or human health.

Japan has also made little progress to address the problems with wild-growing genetically modified canola that we have found near harbours and food oil factories over the past 10 years. These GM crops pose a real risk to local biological diversity as a number of related food crops may be contaminated with GMOs.

Meanwhile, Japanese farmers have completely rejected genetically modified organisms. There is no cultivation of GMOs in Japan for commercial purposes. Very few field trials are ongoing at research institutes, which we are keeping a close eye on. Meanwhile, reports from China indicate that GM rice will not be allowed, which is great news. South Korea also does not grow any GMOs commercially.

The failure of GMO foods to catch on in virtually all parts of Asia by 2014 is a story that needs to be told to the world.

Who we are

Consumers Union of Japan (CUJ) is a politically and financially independent non-governmental organization (NGO). CUJ is funded by membership fees, sales of its publications and donations.
CUJ was founded in April 1969 as Japan's first nationwide grassroots consumer organization. CUJ was officially certified as a non-profit organization on May 1, 2006 by the Japanese NPO legislation.